Week of prayer for Christian unity – January 2007
Umlazi is one of the many townships formed in the 1950s for the black population gathered on the outskirts of the big cities in South Africa. About 750,000 people live in Umlazi, but they lack schools, hospitals, and suitable housing; they don’t even have a field to play soccer on. The unemployment rate is above 40%. Their poverty generates violence, abuse of every type, and a high incidence of AIDS. Many people feel isolated and they are afraid to speak up about their sufferings and their countless problems.
“What can be done?” the leaders of different Christian communities of Umlazi asked themselves. “We need to ‘break the silence,’” they said to each other. “We need to open a real dialogue so we can work on our problems together.” They started with the young people, trying to build a constructive dialogue and deeper relationships with them.
Strengthened by this experience, the Christians of Umlazi made a proposal for the “Week of Prayer for Christian Unity,” which is being held this month in many parts of the world. They suggested a passage in Mark’s Gospel from which this Word of Life is taken.
The Guide for the “Week of Prayer for Christian Unity” 2007 recommends that the intentions for the week include both the striving for unity among Christians and the Christian response to human suffering.
This Word of Life has its roots at a time when Jesus was traveling and “people brought a deaf man who had a speech impediment to him” and he healed him by saying the word “‘Ephphatha!’ that is, ‘Be opened!’” The people, in seeing this, “were exceedingly astonished” (Mk 7:32-39) and exclaimed:
«He has done all things well. He makes the deaf hear and the mute speak»
The miracles performed by Jesus are an expression of his love for all those he met on his journeys. They are also “signs” of the new world that he came to announce. The healing of the deaf and mute man is a sign that Jesus came to bring us a new ability to understand and to speak.
“Ephphatha” was the same word pronounced over us at the time of our Baptism.
“Ephphatha” calls us to open ourselves to hearing the Word of God, so that we allow it to penetrate deeply in us.
“Ephphatha” is his invitation to us to be open and to listen to all those with whom he identified himself—every person, above all, the children, the poor, the needy. He invites us to begin a dialogue of love with all of them, a dialogue that leads to sharing our own Gospel-based experience.
Grateful to Jesus for all that he continues to work in us, let us proclaim with the crowds of his time:
«He has done all things well. He makes the deaf hear and the mute speak»
How should we live this Word of Life?
By breaking through our “deafness” and silencing the noises that block out the voice of God within and around us, as well as the voice of our conscience and the voice of our brothers and sisters.
We often receive requests for help, sometimes tacit ones, from many different people: a child asking for attention, a married couple in crisis, a person who is ill, an older adult, a prisoner, all those who need assistance. We hear the cries of citizens asking for better living conditions, of workers who demand more justice, of entire peoples whose existence is denied. Distracted by a thousand interests and pleasures, our hearts and ears are too often not tuned in to those around us. Or perhaps, focused on our own needs, we may find ourselves pretending not to hear.
The Word of Life asks us to “listen” in order to help others to carry their worries and problems, and also to share in their joys and dreams with a new-found solidarity. It invites us not to be “mute,” but to find the courage to speak: to share our deepest experiences and convictions; to intervene in defense of those who have no voice; to bring about acts of reconciliation; to propose ideas, solutions, new strategies.
And when we feel that we are not able to rise to the occasion, what will make us ready for the task and give us support is this certainty: Jesus, who opened our ears and our mouths:
«He has done all things well. He makes the deaf hear and the mute speak»
Here is an experience of Lucy Shara from South Africa. When she moved with her family to Durban, she found herself facing life in a big city and having to take on a new job with considerable responsibility. Those were the years of apartheid when it was quite unusual for a black African woman to hold a position of leadership.
One day she realized that a form of acute asthma was spreading among the workers and that it was caused by poor working conditions. Many of them would suddenly not show up for work and then would take months off to recover. She spoke with the assistant director about it and proposed a solution: install a machine to purify the air in the environment. But since the machine cost a great deal, at first the company rejected her proposal.
Lucy, however, found strength and light in the Word of Life that she had been trying to live for some time. She felt a fire within her that gave her courage and kept her calm in the midst of all the discussions and helped her to listen with sincerity to the opinions offered by the management. “At a certain point,” she recounted, “my mouth seemed to blossom with just the right words to defend those who had no voice of their own. I was able to show the directors that the initial high cost would pay off with the improved health of the workers who would no longer need to take off because of illness.”
Her words were so convincing that the air purifier was installed. Soon the cases of asthma decreased from 12% to 2%, and the absenteeism also decreased by the same amount. The directors of the company thanked her, and even gave her an extra bonus in her salary. Joy spread among the workers as they breathed a new atmosphere in the factory, in every sense!
Chiara Lubich
Christmas 2006 – The youngest members protest: “They have evicted Jesus”
“… This wealthy world has “kidnapped” Christmas and everything around it, and evicted Jesus! It loves the poetry, the atmosphere, the friendships, the presents, the lights, the stars, and the songs. It looks to Christmas for the best profits of the year. But there is no thought of Jesus”. These words of Chiara Lubich, from the meditation “They have evicted Jesus”, gave rise to a very novel idea, promoted by the Gen 4, the youngest members of the Focolare Movement. Every Christmas since 1996, they have braved the winter cold and rampant consumerism, to offer statuettes of the child Jesus in big city squares and shopping centres. 
This year’s project has taken them to Central Park, New York, Piazza del Popolo in Rome, to the heart of Turin in via Po… Eight thousand small baskets were despatched from the world Gen 4 centre to be used as cradles for the child Jesus, to be welcomed into homes from Spain to Japan, from Africa to Sweden. Here are some stories from different parts of the world: Turin – Taking many “child Jesus” When Margherita, a little girl from Turin, saw on the TV news that some supermarket chains had stopped selling cribs because they were “not commercially viable”, she exclaimed, “this year we will have to take many, many (statuettes of) the child Jesus!” Germany – He came back with two envelopes The German Gen 4 put their stall in a Christmas market. A man came up and took a statuette in his hands, looked at it, then went off without taking it. The Gen 4 decided to give it to him as a gift. They caught him up and said, “We want to give this to you as a present!”. His eyes lit up. He told them that he had lost his job and had no money to buy a statuette, then said goodbye and went home. After a while he came back with two envelopes. He wanted to give them a gift too. In the first envelope there was a prayer written out for them, and in the second a letter that said, “Ciao, dear children! I want to thank you for the biggest gift that there is. I’ll never forget it. You gave me a big surprise! I wish you all a Happy Christmas and beautiful presents.” Dallas (Texas) – No time to stop 
For the first time, the Gen 4 in Dallas had permission to offer the statuettes of the child Jesus outside a big office block. But it was not easy: people passed by, muttering “No thank you”, or asking, “What are they? Biscuits?” The Gen 4 were quite dismayed, and asked themselves, “How come all these people don’t even have the time to stop and take Jesus home with them?” So they asked Jesus to help them to bring all his love to these people: it didn’t matter if they didn’t collect any money for the poor, they knew they were there to bring Him into the world. They didn’t give up: they prepared coloured posters offering the statuettes as a gift for Christmas, and sang carols. The people began to stop and take the statuettes. A lady who wanted to take one realised that she had left her purse at home. Without hesitating, the Gen 4 gave it to her, and she went away happy and touched by the gesture. The Gen 4 were happy too: Jesus had found yet another home. When they came to count the money, they remembered that they ought to have given 10% to the company that owned the office block. They went together to the director’s office, where he told them that he didn’t want anything: in fact he wanted to make his contribution too, so that through the Gen 4 the money would get to those who needed it most. Trent – You are all invited to my house Silvia and Monica met together to make the plaster statuettes of the child Jesus. They decided to invite their friends too. Silvia wrote the invitations: “On Saturday afternoon you are all invited to my house, to make statuettes of Baby Jesus”, and the day afterwards gave them out to her classmates. On Saturday ten of them turned up to work! Before starting, Silvia and Monica showed them all a video where the Gen 4 explain their action “they have evicted Jesus”. No one wanted to go home at the end, and they promised to meet again soon. Pisa – I can do acts of love too! A very distinguished gentleman, finding himself in front of Lorenzo, who offered him a statuette, answered, “ I’m not interested, I’m an atheist.” Lorenzo answered, “I’m a Gen 4. What is an atheist?”. “And what are the Gen 4?”, asked the man. “The Gen 4 are those who do acts of love”. “Well, even if I don’t believe, I can do an act of love too!”, he concluded, and taking a statuette, left a very generous offering. (Other stories may be found in the book “Hanno sloggiato Gesù (They have evicted Jesus)”, Città Nuova, 2005)
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
Christmas, and the Invisible made itself visible. The Word became flesh. The Light shone in the darkness. If God came down from heaven for us, There is no doubt that he loves us! If God himself loves us, everything on this earth is easier for us, everything makes more sense: behind the obscure passages of our existence we can read the loving hand of God; the reasons may often be unknown to us, but they are reasons of love. Chiara Lubich
Word of Life – December 2006
The poet who composed the Psalm from which this Word of Life comes had been on a pilgrimage to the temple of Jerusalem. He wanted to remain there, just as the sparrows who had built their nests there, but he had to return to his home (or: to his land). He remembered with nostalgia the “lovely … dwelling place” of the Lord where he experienced the presence of God. He then decided to go back again and so he set off on the journey to Jerusalem. It would be a “holy journey” that would once again put him “in front of God.” As in all cultures and faiths, the journey was a metaphor for life.
The “holy journey” is the symbol for the roads we need to take to reach God. We are in fact headed towards a final end that we should not call “death” but rather an “encounter” because it is not an ending but the beginning of a new Life with God. We are all called to this by him.
Why not then plan our whole lives with this goal in mind? Why not turn the only life we have into a journey, a holy journey, because the one who is waiting for us is the holy One?
Yes, we are all called to become holy: “This is the will of God, your holiness” (1 Thes 4:3). God loves each of us, individually, with an immense love. He has thought up and planned a specific itinerary for each of us to follow, with a precise finish line to reach.
«Happy are those who find refuge in you, whose hearts are set on pilgrim roads»
Certainly we are children of our time, a time with a predilection for activism – at times unbridled – and for efficiency, which values certain occupations and undervalues others, which quietly neglects some of the challenges of life out of fear and with the illusion that they will just go away.
Perhaps we too, influenced and blinded by similar tendencies, may uselessly waste our energies. Perhaps we too might consider taking days off to rest as unnecessary, setting aside moments for prayer as superfluous, and viewing our illnesses and various difficulties – which God permits in his plan of love for us – as merely obstacles along our path.
How can we begin or get back in step seriously with our own holy journey? It is not difficult to discover how: by not doing our own will, but doing the will of God. We can do this by following him in each present moment of our lives, knowing that – and this is a huge gift – we are accompanied by a special grace in everything that we do in this way, by the “actual grace” that enlightens our minds and helps us to direct our wills and sensitivities to what is good.
Even those who do not embrace any religious creed can make a masterpiece of their life by embarking with uprightness on a journey of sincere moral commitment.
«Happy are those who find refuge in you, whose hearts are set on pilgrim roads»
If life is a long “holy journey” traced out by the will of God, our itinerary demands that we progress every day. Love urges us to keep growing, to improve always. We cannot be content with how we lived yesterday, so we should regularly tell ourselves, “Today, better than yesterday.”
And what should we do when we stop, or when we go backwards by falling into our old ways or by just giving in to laziness? Should we remain discouraged by our mistakes and give up our goal? No, in these moments, our motto should be: “start out again,” first of all by entrusting our past, with all its mistakes and sins, to God’s mercy.
To start over again, by trusting completely in God’s grace, rather than counting on our own strength. Doesn’t the Word of Life tell us that we can find our refuge in him? We can start over each day as though it were the first day of our holy journey.
Above all, let us journey together, united in love, by helping one another. Then The Saint will be among us and he will become the “Way” for us. He will help us to understand the will of God better, and he will give us the desire and the ability to carry it out. If we are united everything will become easier and we will experience the beatitude promised to those who embark on the holy journey.
«Happy are those who find refuge in you, whose hearts are set on pilgrim roads»
These verses from the Psalms remind me of how a friend of mine lived. His name was Enzo Fondi.
In 1951, when he was twenty-two years old and living in Rome, Enzo decided to follow God completely within the recently formed Focolare Movement. After he received his medical degree as a surgeon, Enzo began his practice behind the “iron curtain” in a hospital in Leipzig, then East Germany. There he wished to bear witness to a love that is rooted in the Gospel. He was later ordained a priest. After a number of years he journeyed to the United States to continue to spread the same message.
During the latter part of his life his journeys did not let up. His work for the interreligious dialogue promoted by the Movement brought him to different places with various commitments, but the project was always the same: to follow God’s will. He concluded his long “holy journey” on New Year’s Eve 2001. That evening he was found in front of his computer as though still at work, with his head leaning on the table, his face serene and without a trace of suffering. More than having passed on, he seemed to have simply passed from one “room” to the next.
Fifteen days before his death, he had written, “My last will and testament: for me, the last will of God is the one he wants from me now. There is no other. To accomplish the last will of God perfectly, whatever it may be, this is my last will. I don’t know what the last will of God will really be for me, but one thing I do know is this: I will have the actual grace to do the will of God at the end of my life in so far as I have tried to take advantage of this grace by living each present moment well.”
Chiara Lubich
Chiara Lubich’s health improving
Chiara Lubich’s health is steadily improving. Taken into the Policlinico Agostino Gemelli hospital in Rome on November 2nd with breathing difficulties caused by a lung infection, Chiara Lubich has now been discharged from intensive care. The Director of the unit, prof. Massimo Antonelli, stated, “her positive response to treatment has allowed her to reach a stable and satisfactory clinical condition”. The Movement is extremely grateful for all the care received, and for the availability and competence of the Director and his associates. On November 21, the Secretary of State of the Vatican, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, visited Chiara, after celebrating Mass for the inauguration of the new academic year at the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart. Giving her another blessing from the Pope, he also gave her a rosary on his behalf. The following day Chiara was visited by prof. Lorenzo Ornaghi, Rector of the Catholic University. Among the messages that arrive each day: One from the President of Ireland, Mary McAleese, and others from members of the European, Italian, and Brazilian Parliaments of various parties, from the Mayor of Rome, Walter Veltroni, and Alberto Pacher, Mayor of Trento, Chiara’s birthplace, who expressed the city’s concern for her health. The head of the Italian Government, Romano Prodi, sent a wish that “her stay in hospital be very short”, because, he adds, “we need you too much….”. Warm wishes and assurances of prayers have come from the General Secretary of the World Conference of Religions for Peace (WCRP), Dr William Vendley, and from Jewish friends. including Rabbis and leaders, from Israel, Argentina and the United States. The Chief Rabbi of Rome, Riccardo di Segni, wishes that “her body be as strong as her spirit and manage to overcome this crisis”